How Fifty Crocodiles Wanted to Eat up One Little Rabbit

How Fifty Crocodiles Wanted to Eat up One Little Rabbit

One day a rabbit went to eat some grass near the river. He ate some grass, drank some water and then went to sleep under a tree.

That night it rained, and in the morning the ground on which the Rabbit had slept was like an island. There was water all round it. The poor little Rabbit did not know what to do. He could not jump to the other bank of the river because at that place the river was very wide after the rain. And he was afraid to swim, because there were many crocodiles in the river.

One of the crocodiles put his head out of the water and said: " I am happy to see you, Rabbit! Come nearer, my dear. We shall eat you up, my

friends and I. Your meat must be very good."

The Rabbit was frightened. But he did not show that he was frightened. And he answered: "My meat is very good only if crocodiles eat very little of it. How many of you are here?"

"We are thirty." answered an old crocodile.

"That's very bad," said the Rabbit. "You must be fifty at least. My meat is poisonous and you must eat very little of it. You may eat me up now, but you will all die tomorrow."

"If you say so," said the old Crocodile, "then three crocodiles will go and ask twenty other cro­codiles to come here and help us to eat you up. And twenty-seven crocodiles will stay here and see that you don't run away."

Soon three crocodiles came back and with them were twenty other crocodiles. The old Crocodile said: " Now we are fifty, Rabbit, and we shall eat you up."

"If you are fifty, not more and not less, you may eat me up," answered the Rabbit. "But did you count well? Are you fifty?"

"Yes, we are fifty."

"If you did not count well, you will all die," said the Rabbit.

The crocodiles were frightened. They thought: "What if we are forty-nine or fifty-one?" And they said to the Rabbit: "Please, little Rabbit, count us again! You are so clever!"

"No, I don't want to do it," answered the Rabbit.

"Dear little Rabbit, count us, please! You will do it better than we!"

"Well, if you want, I shall count you! But you must lie down side by side in the water, from this island to the bank of the river. Then I shall see all of you and count you well."

The crocodiles did as the Rabbit told them. Then the Rabbit said to the Old Crocodile: "May I walk over the backs of your friends? I must see them all and count them well."

The Old Crocodile answered: "Do as you like, dear Rabbit, only count us well."

The Rabbit began to count. As he counted, he jumped over the backs of the crocodiles: "One, two, three, four... ten... fifteen... twenty-five... fifty !"

When he counted fifty, he jumped to the bank of the river and ran away into the forest.